Switzerland: 1,5 billion to make roads suitable for Gigaliners

20 Jul 2011. If Gigaliners would be allowed in Switzerland horrendous additional costs for the taxpayers were the result. This is the conclusion of a study by the consulting engineers of Borlini & Zanini who examined the impact of longer and heavier vehicles (LHVs) on the road infrastructure on behalf of the Swiss NoMegatrucks coalition.

Accordingly additional 1.5 billion Swiss francs for road maintenance and extension were needed if LHVs would be allowed in Switzerland – annually over a period of 15 years. As the consultants concentrated their analysis on the highway network only, this vastly amount does not even include the infrastructure costs for canton and rural roads.

In other European countries the admission of longer and heavier trucks would also lead to substantial follow-up costs. The German Highway Research Institute (BASt) calculated the cost which would apply for the modification of the highway bridges in Germany to 8 billion Euros. This sum does also not include expenses for subordinated road network. Roads, tunnels (increased fire load) and crash barriers cannot cope with oversized and overweight trucks. Parking places for trucks would be too short and costly adjustments of railway crossings were needed. All these expenses would be passed on to the people – a bottomless pit for taxpayers' money.

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